“You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of.” — Jim Rohn
This is a wonderfully life-giving and empowering reminder to me. I do not hear it as piety but as prophetically wise, not as quietism but responsibility-taking, not as escapism but as incredible rigor. My clients and students who are working on sustainable activism, biblical self-care, forgiveness or coming out as gay or lesbian Christians are thriving because they are learning what they REALLY have charge of — their “energy leadership.”
This approach – quite suitable for Lent — yokes self-examination with the tasks of transformation of circumstances. It makes the interior life the starting point.
I join others from time to time in the critique of Western individualism and the corrosive impact it has had when taken to the extreme. But I will not settle for a faith and a justice-calling that does not take seriously — reverentially — that resilience that can be cultivated only when we remember the limits of what we have charge of…
It is, I would go so far to say, GOOD NEWS.
What do you think?